InfoStrat president James Townsend's thoughts on digital transformation, marketing automation, customer relationship management, Microsoft Dynamics 365 (formerly CRM), government contracting, customer service and more. For breaking news, follow me on Twitter @jamestownsend and for more depth see the InfoStrat website at www.infostrat.com

Subscribe to this blog

Follow by Email

Search This Blog

Back to the Future -- Cloud Infrastructure Pricing

A growing trend in cloud computing is to set prices based on actual utilization of resources such as memory, storage, processing, and bandwidth. This is a rational way to price cloud infrastructure, because these are the items that contribute to the cost of cloud hosting, especially as the scale of a solution increases.

One of the benefits of moving to the cloud is to not have to worry whether you have enough computing resources, because it is so easy to add more resources in a cloud environment.

In some ways, this is a throwback to timesharing, the venerable practice of buying time on an expensive mainframe when it was inconceivable that everyone would own their own computer.

The downside of usage-based pricing is that the actual bill is hard to predict. Without knowing the cost in advance, budgeting is challenging. How can a customer plan for this expense?

Another risk is that utilization of resources may be beyond your control. You could have a surge of real or fake users hitting your site or apps and then get a high monthly bill. No doubt companies will step in with approaches to reduce the risk of pricing uncertainty, as has happened in other industries. Buyers of cloud computing can also take comfort knowing that pricing is on a steady decline -- at least for now.

Get link

Facebook

Twitter

Pinterest

Google+

Email

Other Apps

Get link

Facebook

Twitter

Pinterest

Google+

Email

Other Apps

Popular posts from this blog

The Digital Accountability and Transparency Act enacted in May 2014 calls for making spending data available in open, standardized formats to be published online. It is a continuation of transparency initiatives and lessons learned with experiences such as grants.gov, the 2009 economic stimulus under the Recovery Act and the spending site USASpending.gov.

Government grantees will have significant new administrative responsibilities. Many organizations that were tracking grants in spreadsheets or documents will have to adopt more sophisticated automated grant management systems such as Microsoft Grants Manager to keep up with reporting rules.

For profit companies will lose some privacy as a result of this law. Grant recipients will be required to disclose information including officer salaries.

Continued improvements to publishing grant opportunities such as grants.gov may make it easier to find grants. These reforms together are designed to improve the effectiveness of grant prog…

Here are some answers to frequently asked question on this solution:Can I add new fields to the solution? -- Yes, the solution is fully customizable and you can add your own new fields to any form, view or report.Does Dynamics 365 for GovCon work on mobile devices? -- Yes, Microsoft offers mobile apps for all the most popular platforms including iPhone, iPad, and Android phone and tablets.Does Dynamics 365 connect with bid data systems such as Deltek and Onvia? -- Some information services, such as Onvia, offer integration with Dynamics 365. Others require third party solutions such as the InfoStrat integration with Deltek GovWin IQ.What do customers typically customize for their unique requirements? -- Not all contractors follow the same steps in the capture process. Most clients will tailor the business process to add or remove steps in order to match their sales methodology. Of…

This month my company InfoStrat announced its participation in Microsoft CityNext, a global initiative empowering cities, businesses and citizens to re-imagine their futures and cultivate vibrant communities. Through the Microsoft CityNext initiative, Microsoft and InfoStrat will help leaders to do “new with less,” by combining the power of technology with innovative ideas to connect governments, businesses and citizens with city services that increase efficiencies, reduce costs, foster a more sustainable environment and cultivate communities where people thrive. In a recent study, IDC named Microsoft the most trusted smart-city vendor. "Whether it's traffic congestion, citizen services, energy efficiency or operating costs, our Microsoft CityNext partners are equipped to tackle whatever problem or priority local governments want to address. Microsoft’s IDC smart-city scores are really a credit to our partners, which leverage our trusted cloud platform, powerful data analytic…

About Me

James Townsend, Founder and CEO of www.infostrat.com, is a leading expert on Microsoft solutions for government, and a pioneer of Microsoft Dynamics 365 (formerly Dynamics CRM) as a development platform. He has published over fifty articles and books on software development and other topics.